Ever had one? One of those days where you wish you would have stayed in bed? I had one last week. Well, actually I had two of them in a row. My boy Jeremy had just gotten the cast off his arm from the break he received when he fell out of the tree 2 months ago. So, Thursday evening, we decided to take our dirt bikes out and go riding. We had ridden about an hour when Jer flipped his bike on a jump and it landed on his foot, thus breaking it. So to the house we go to get a few things before we head to the emergency room. Before we leave the house though, we should let Molly out. Molly is our 5 pound Maltese. The baby of the family. She is almost ready to come into the house when the neighbors dog comes over and mauls her. She wasn’t hurt badly, only bruised and frightened, but we don’t have time to comfort her because Jeremy is needing to go get X- rays. This has turned out to be a very bad day.

I wake up Friday morning, thinking, ok the worst is behind us. It’s a brand new day, right?! Wrong. All I did was turn my head and sneeze. That’s all. But now my neck has gone into a spasm and the vertebrae are out and I can’t move my neck in any direction more than an inch without causing excruciating pain. So I lay on the bed for an hour. Unable to move. (6 days, and 2 chiropractor appointments later, I’m still in pain.) Boy this is starting out to be a bad day. Unable to get an appointment with a chiropractor, I suffered though a very painful day at the computer, with set back after set back on site development. Finally after a long, frustrating, painful day, my wife and I (still suffering) go to bed hoping tomorrow will be better.

Two hours later the phone rings. It’s Kristi, our 17 year old. She was driving back from church camp, a 2.5 hour drive from Indianapolis and fell asleep at the wheel. All she could tell us was that she was in a wreck. She didn’t know where she was at and the car is totaled. We asked her if anyone had stopped to help her. “No”. “Do you see any road signs?” Frantic and in shock, she replied in tears, “No, I don’t know where I’m at.” I cannot tell you how fearful my wife and I were. Not only were we not able to tell the police where she was, but we really did not know her condition since she was in shock and unable to tell us very much.

Guessing her time of departure and the approximate distance in the trip, I called the State Police and told them the situation and to look for her on Route 65 between Rensselaer and Lowe, about a 60 mile stretch. Amazingly the phone rings 10 minutes later and the fire department has found her 1 mile off the exit ramp from Rensselaer. To our relief she is bruised, but ok. God really had his hand on her. She hit the guardrail at around 65 MPH, completely destroying the guardrail and totaled out the car.

But God is good isn’t He! At the end of a second very bad day, I got to hold my baby girl in my arms and thank God for keeping her from certain death. Holding her, I realized that by all rights, we should be in a hospital room seeing the worst.

We can complain about the neck spasms, dog fights, broken bones, and bad days at the office, but when it’s all over we really just need to stop and thank the Lord for breath. Thank Him for our children. Thank Him for a job, any job. We would complain about the old junk car that we are driving, but we need to notice the old lady walking home from the grocery store with bags in her arms and a long walk ahead of her. How blessed we really are.

It’s hard to think of all your blessings when you’re hurting and in pain. But be careful, you might just get a call like I did at 2 in the morning. Only, you might not be so fortunate. Many people are not.

Have you taken a walk through a Cancer ward lately? How about the Coma ward of a large hospital. These are very humbling places. They help bring your life into perspective. If you are feeling like life has got you down, you ought to make the trip. You will walk out feeling like one of the most blessed people in the world.

Kristi is wanting to go to South Africa with me early next year. This is something I can’t afford, but have wanted to do for a long time. I’m looking forward to the trip for one reason. To get my life into perspective. I believe it will do the same for Kristi.

We are all very spoiled. God has been so good to most of us that when the slightest wind blows in our life, we think we are being persecuted. God must be against us because we lost our job or the car broke down.

At the end of a very very very bad day or two, I say “Thank You Lord!”

• Thank you that I still have breath.
• Thank you that my children are still in one piece.
• Thank you that I haven’t lost my mind.
• Thank you for my salvation experience.
• Thank you for my church.
• Thank you for my wife.
• Thank you for food to eat.
• Thank you for my sore, tired, hurting body.
• Thank you for the car we have left.
• Thank you for our house so my family didn’t have to sleep out in that storm we had last night.
• Thank you for our little Molly.
• Thank you Lord, You have been very good. Very good indeed!